Space Cowboy
by JWood201
Summary: "Pack your bags, Durango. We're going on an adventure!" Eight year old Deanna Troi leaves Betazed for the first time on a very important mission.


_This is the biggest retcon and I'm not really sorry about it._

 _Majel's ghost made me do it._

 **Space Cowboy**

Space.

Above. Around. _Inside_.

There's just so _much_ of it.

In the sky. In our house. In me. In Mommy's eyes.

It's in the conversations that I can't hear yet. It's in Daddy's closet where I hide to read real books because it still smells like his uniforms. I see it on the inside of my eyelids when I squeeze my eyes shut and try to remember.

The stars sparkle like Mommy's engagement ring. Ancient Earth men used to pull stars from the sky and give them to their wives to show them how much they loved them. I like that.

"I'm going to marry a human," I say one day, snuggled into her side and idly spinning her ring around her finger while she reads out loud from _Cowboy Ralph's Adventures_. I know she doesn't understand these books and she doesn't do the voices right, but I like it when she tries.

She looks down at me and I know she wants to tell me that if I do my kids might not have any telepathic powers. I can't hear her in my mind yet – I might not ever be able to hear her – but I know what she's thinking because she pauses the tiniest bit before she smiles and squeezes me to her. "You can marry whoever you want, Little One."

She means it, but not all the way.

Mommy went to space and she came back with presents. Shiny things from faraway worlds. She also came back with _noise_. Music and other languages and recordings of sounds that sent my grandfather out the front door. He stood in the middle of the street and glared at the house until she finally turned it off.

Sometimes late at night, after my grandfather goes home, Mommy and I sit on the floor in the dark and listen to the Kasseelian opera until my heart hurts and she starts to cry.

Daddy went to space and he didn't come back.

I've never been to space.

Not many eight year olds have, I guess.

Mommy is fighting with her father again. When she gets really mad she forgets and says things out loud and that makes him madder. Sometimes they fight about me and about how I might never have enough telepathic powers to lead the Fifth House and she screams at him so loud in her head that sometimes I think I can hear her in my head.

I'm standing on a chair half a house away trying to ignore them, but their silent argument is buzzing in the back of my mind like a swarm of Earth bees. Maybe that's a good sign.

I'm staring into the serious face of a life-size holographic woman. She's as tall as Mommy with thick dark brown hair that sits on top of her shoulders. She has her hands behind her back and is staring right through me.

"This is your Great-Great-Aunt Lwahera," Mommy said that morning as she pushed a button and this see-through woman sprang to life in the living room. "Her daddy was a human like yours."

"Did she have powers?" I ask and Mommy looks unhappy that this is my first question, but I need to know. She sits down and pulls me into her lap and I lean back against her.

"No. None." She wraps her arms around me. "But her sister, your Great-Great-Grandmother Vealla, was a very talented telepath. There's no rhyme or reason, Little One." She sighs and I can feel her sadness so strong that I sit up, pulling my back away from her chest. "The people of old Betazed were cruel to our Aunt because she wasn't what they wanted her to be. I didn't even know she existed until last week. She had to give up her right to lead the Fifth House to her younger sister. _But_ she went to Earth and went to school and became a very accomplished woman!"

I turn and look at her, nervous all of a sudden about the fate of our House. "I don't have a sister."

Mommy's heart breaks and I feel it and I have to hold onto her hands so I don't jump off her lap and run away. "Oh, Deanna," she whispers and kisses the spot between my eyebrows that's scrunched up with worry. "You'll be the best daughter the Fifth House has ever seen. No matter what. Our people have come a long way since then, thankfully."

"No, they haven't," I say, running my finger over the smooth part of the shiny star on her finger. I fill my head with the kids at school. Most are nice, but the mean ones are louder. I know she can hear them because she tightens her arms around me and buries her face in my hair. "I'm not what they want me to be. It just takes them longer to figure it out because I have your black Betazoid eyes."

I look up at the hologram. She wears a gold shirt that has a badge on it like Daddy's, but hers is older and made of shiny cloth.

She's majestic. She looks like my mother.

But she has the brightest blue eyes I've ever seen.

I'm standing on the chair staring into Aunt Lwahera's eyes when the buzzing in the back of my head stops. I lean forward, trying to get as close to those eyes as I can, and almost fall off the chair. They're like oceans. Or icebergs. Or the spring sky.

I catch myself, twirling my arms like a bird for balance, and stand upright as Mommy enters the room. I get ready to tell her that now I decided that I'm going to marry a human with blue eyes, but she's smiling the smile that makes me excited and scared and all my words leave me. My grandfather is frowning, but she's so happy that the whole room is shaking. For a second I think we're having an earthquake that no one else can feel. "Pack your bags, Durango! We're going on an _adventure_!"

Space.

Above. Around. _Below_.

There's _so much_.

I push my face against the window of the transport, trying to see what's underneath the ship.

More stars. Forever and ever.

Enough for all the men on every planet in every galaxy to pull from the sky to show their wives how much they love them.

This is a real adventure because Mommy is wearing pants. Shiny tight pants, but still pants. With an even shinier tunic and tall brown boots that are soft like the insides of our dog's ears. We share one small suitcase with wheels, so she left all her wigs and most of her jewelry at home. Her hair – her _real_ hair – is brown and curly and hangs over her shoulder in one big long loose braid. She has a headband with the red jewels of our House inside her curls. She looks prettiest like this.

Mommy says the Captain is called a Tellarite. And there's an Andorian across the aisle. One of her antenna moves and I'm pretty sure it knows I'm thinking about her.

A big Lurian a few rows behind us sees me looking at him and he tips his imaginary hat like the cowboys in Daddy's ancient western movies. I say "howdy" to him, but he doesn't say anything back.

A very tall serious man with pointy ears nodded at me in the spaceport and Mommy raised her left hand in a greeting I'd never seen before. He seemed to appreciate it, so I copied her. When did it back, I think he almost smiled.

I'm lying across the seat, my head in Mommy's lap, watching the stars go by the window. She's looking at something on a PADD. I have her left arm pulled across my stomach, our fingers tangled together.

"Where are we going?"

She moves the PADD and looks down at me like she forgot she never told me. She's sideways.

"Earth, of course."

I grip her fingers hopefully. "To see Grandma?"

She blinks. "Oh. No. Not this time, darling." I look out the window again. There's a planet out there, far away. It's yellow. I know she's watching me. "How about next year we go visit her instead of making her come all the way to Betazed?"

I look back up at her. She means it and I nod. "Have you been to Greece?"

"I have."

"What's it like?"

Mommy frowns and puts the PADD down. "Old."

"Good." I trace all of the sides of the star in her ring. "Then where are we going?"

"California."

I stop. "There used to be cowboys in California."

She combs her fingers through my hair. "And movie stars."

"And movie stars who pretended to be cowboys!"

Mommy laughs her best laugh and it fills up the transport and it fills up the space in me. People turn around to look, but I don't care.

I sit up and climb into her lap so I'm facing her. "Where's Mr. Xelo?"

"At home. We don't need him. We're strong, independent women." She gets quiet and squints at the Andorian across the aisle like she's suspicious. I know she's just kidding, but I lean in like it's a big secret. "And we're on a very important mission."

California is warm like home, but with less green and less flowers. The air smells like salt and noisy birds try to steal everyone's lunch. There's a big red bridge that the humans say is gold.

We get real chocolate ice cream and watch the seals lie around doing nothing. We eat American hamburgers and grilled cheese sandwiches and I almost throw up, but I don't want to because the cheese is so good. Some kids are hitting a ball with a piece of wood in the park. I have a fuzzy memory of Daddy telling me about this game. We ride the rolling suitcase down the street and I stop myself from telling her it's a bad idea. Mommy laughs more than she has all year and there's a little less space in me.

Mommy's adventure boots are loud on the shiny floor and people look, but it doesn't bother her. I don't know how she knows exactly where she's going in this giant building. I look up and twist around trying to see the ceiling. It's so far up it might as well be in space. I stop in the middle of the lobby and squint up into the sunlight coming in through the big round window in the ceiling. The sun is sharp in the air and it draws patterns on the Starfleet symbol on the lobby floor.

Last night we stayed in a hotel and snuggled into forty-seven pillows in the middle of the giant bed watching everything in the computer's entertainment list. Black and white shows about a woman who wants to sing and dance with her husband. He's from another country and their son is half one thing and half another just like me, but no one seems to notice. It's funny, but it's also sweet and the woman makes big faces like Mommy. There were shows about friendly monsters and witches and not-friendly zombies. Astronauts in fake space. A cowboy with three sons who wanted to help everyone.

"I've come for Lwahera Troi."

The woman in red looks up from her PADD. I hear the quiet noises of the game she's playing. She seems surprised to see anyone in her office. "And who are you?"

Mommy seems to grow fifteen centimeters and she becomes royalty right in front of us. " _I_ am Lwax—!" She stops when the woman turns away from her. I'm just tall enough to look over the edge of her big desk if I stand on my toes and she smiles at me. Mommy goes back to her regular height and squeezes my hand. "We're her family. We're taking her home."

We wait in the middle of a round room with another high ceiling. It's darker here and very quiet. The walls are bumpy with words.

 _She's here_.

 _Mommy?_

She's staring across the room, holding my hand in both of hers. She can't hear me, but I think I can hear her.

 _His name's here._

The words all over the walls are people. People who went to space and didn't come back.

The Starfleet officer returns carrying a shiny wooden box. She looks like she's trying not to cry, but also very happy that she gets to do her job today. I don't think a lot of people come to her office. She says something about preservation and freezing and I'm not sure I want to hear more, so I move toward the wall.

"We keep them forever, just in case, but most are here because they don't have anyone to claim them." She presses the box gently into Mommy's hands. "She's been here a long time."

When she opens the box, she gasps and my lungs fill up too. I might lift off the floor. She runs her fingers over the metal, the shapes and the ribbons, and I make fists so my fingertips stop itching with them.

"This is the Karagite Order of Heroism," the woman says. "And the Starfleet Medal of Honor."

The people who didn't come back from space are listed on the wall under their last ship, in ABC order, so I move around the room to start at the beginning.

"The Starfleet Medal of Commendation. The Award of Valor."

I find Daddy under the _U.S.S. Carthage_ and stare at his name until it stops looking like real words.

"The Grankite Order of Tactics."

I move slowly around the room, looking at all the names. All the people who wanted to go to space to have an adventure. The cowboys who wanted to help everyone.

"She's still the youngest female first officer ever in the fleet."

Mommy closes the box of medals and holds it close to her chest. She's already crying quietly. I move down the line of ships.

The Starfleet officer shuffles nervously. "Her file says that the Fifth House of Betazed was contacted back then, but …"

 _Dakota_. _Discovery._ _Edison_. So many names.

"They said she wasn't theirs."

Mommy clutches the box and her stomach falls. One sob echoes around the room. Her anger explodes inside me and I almost fall over. She's mad and sad and proud of her Aunt all at once. My heart hurts like it's filled with rocks. It hurts worse because hers does too, and then I see it.

"I found her!"

I might have said it in my head without knowing first, because Mommy is already looking at me when I turn around. Her eyes are red, dripping tears onto the box. I point at the wall.

" _Enterprise_."

On the transport, I sit on the floor in the cargo bay, leaning over the top of the special box. Mommy sits nearby, leaning against our suitcase, the wooden box of medals in her arms. I peer in the window of the casket. It crackles with frost on the inside. Aunt Lwahera looks like she's sleeping. I think really hard, asking her to open her eyes so I can see how bright blue they really are.

 _Deanna._

I look up at her.

 _That will never happen to you. I promise_.

I stare at her. Her mouth didn't move. "I heard you." She holds out an arm and I crawl under it to curl up at her side. "You can't hear me."

"Not yet. But don't worry, your telepathy won't stop developing until you're a teenager. Lucky me." I slide my arm around her waist and move my head so I can hear her heart.

"I feel you. What you feel. In me." I look up at her. She's staring at the casket like she's been waiting for me to say this. "It hurts."

She nods knowingly. "An empath, huh?"

"Yeah. What's that?"

"That's special. That's compassion. Like the cowboy with the kind sons. You'll have to protect your heart. I'll try to teach you, but I was never very good at keeping my heart to myself." She kisses the top of my head and lays her cheek down against my hair. "Go ahead and marry your blue-eyed human, Little One. You'll be fine."

In the cemetery, Mommy and I wear our white Betazoid mourning dresses. My grandfather didn't come with us. He's embarrassed about what happened, but he's glad she's back even though he won't say it. We put the box of medals on the mantle over the fireplace next to the Holy Rings so that everyone who comes over will see them.

Aunt Lwahera joins the rest of the family whether they want her there or not, because she belongs there. She's with her parents, her sister, her nieces and nephews. She's with Daddy and the one space where the name is covered up that no one talks about. She's with my grandmother and my Aunt Kestra who I never met and names I don't recognize going back more than thirty-six generations. And she's with us.

"Well, Durango," Mommy says in her bad Cowboy Ralph voice as we leave the mausoleum, "I reckon that was a mighty fine adventure." I laugh at her and she gives up on the voice, swinging our hands between us. "And a successful space mission."

Space.

There's less of it now.

Around us. Between us. Inside us.


End file.
